WTF!? You don't have a run menu?

[darkblade1.livejournal.com]

This case probably goes down in the WTF file....just like most of these LJ posts.

Ok...so it goes like this:
(these are just my thoughts, so they don't make sense)
*caller calls in*

She pretty much describes to me what's going on. She notes she can't check her email, and she blurbs out that OE could not find the host pop.XXX.XXX.XXX. So I ask her if her internet explorer is working. So she opens it up, and lo and behold, that's not working. So clearly an internet issue. So I take a look at the signals on her cable modem, signals on modem look fine, and she has a valid ip address with valid lease time communicating with her nic, and I can ping not only her ip, but her default gateway.

So, I figure...what the hell, might as well check the ip address on her pc.

So, I ask her to click start.

She clicks start.

I then ask her to click run.

"You don't have a run option?"

No.

"Ok, well let's try programs>accessories, then should be listed in there."

No, not seeing it.

*This is where i'm thinking wtf...*

Ok, well let's restart the system.

So we reboot, and before we reboot she tells me it's win2k.

Okay cool, so we have a stable OS on it.

While's she's rebooting, it boots into safe mode for some reason.

I ask her to reboot, but don't push anything. This time it boots normally...she notes it's ME.

So I ask for the run menu again...she reads off all the options, but no run menu.

So I take her into search, and search for command.exe.

Nothing found.

So I search for cmd.exe. Also, found nothing.

Somehow her system is screwed up, amazingly, she seems to function just fine.

I gave up after that, I just referred to Dell after that. I'm usually not that bad, but cmon...no freakin run menu?

It's been one of those days guys&girls.

WTF!!!

Comments

[wesmills.livejournal.com]

Ouch, someone's been doing some locking down on that bad boy. EEEEEEVIL customers :(

(For the record, it's command.com on 9x/ME systems, and cmd.exe on NT-based systems)

[dmsalem00.livejournal.com]

True, but start->run->"command" still works.

Causing endless waves of confusion.

[malgrep.livejournal.com]

Back when I was doing ISP support one of my first calls was someone that had a corrupt TCP/IP stack. I went in to the control panel in win98 and there was no icon for Network (or whatever it was named. it has been about 5 years). There was also no System icon, or Modem icon.

[axessdenyd.livejournal.com]

I had a good one come in the other week where there was nothing on their computer except a big icon that was labeled "Folder". Apparently it used to be "My Computer" but I have absolutely no idea how that could get messedup if you tried...

Oh, lemme rephrase that. Nothing on the computer that you could see when booted from that installation of Windows. We oculd of course see everything on our machine when we took the hard drive out.

*This is where i'm thinking wtf...*

[loosechanj.livejournal.com]

Only because you were so naively assuming she wasn't lying like a f**king bastard.

Re: *This is where i'm thinking wtf...*

[tjernobyl.livejournal.com]

Indeed. Some people just can't or aren't willing to read their screen...

Re: *This is where i'm thinking wtf...*

[darkblade1.livejournal.com]

That's true. She was rather old. Is it wrong to hate old people? LOL.

Re: *This is where i'm thinking wtf...*

[dmsalem00.livejournal.com]

Not at all. They all believe they're old enough to have their "i hate young people" license and gawk at everyone under 40 for no reason.

I usually just gawk back. They never hold eye contact for more than 2 minutes.

[kostika.livejournal.com]

Okay something was screwy there.

just as a side note Win+R bring up the run box also.

[amberfox.livejournal.com]

Cool, thanks! I didn't know that.

[compwizrd.livejournal.com]

Win+E is explorer
Win+M minimizes everything possible
Win+U is the utility manager for disabled people stuff
Win+F is windows find
Win+L locks the computer(need your password to unlock)
Win+B does something.

Hope these help.

[amberfox.livejournal.com]

Coolness. You are the lazy geekgirl's friend.

[axessdenyd.livejournal.com]

Pffft, real keyboards don't have those.

[compwizrd.livejournal.com]

yeah, my thinkpad doesn't have one.. there's a program out there to make the "Thinkpad" button be one, but i never bothered.

[dmsalem00.livejournal.com]

Win+D = Desktop(same thing as Win+M though I think)
Win+Pause|Break = Sys Properties

cocked if I know what Win+B does though.

[geekgrrl-ca.livejournal.com]

makes my task bar show up (it's normally hidden)

[110billion.livejournal.com]

Also, right click on the start button > properties
iirc, you can hide the run option there

[jecook]

Wow, that's pretty strange.

at that point, I'd definately refer her to a service person to look at it.

[darkblade1.livejournal.com]

First off, thanks for the keyboard shortcuts. I didn't know the windows key had that much power. Now I have future reference. As far as today went, usually I would go farther...but I'm sure where we've all had those days where our patience is shot..

Anyone agree?

[the-s-guy.livejournal.com]

Pretty much. Although it's possible that you could eventually have de-screwed or unlocked the changes that someone, sometime had made to that laptop, it could have taken hours or days over the phone. The bump to Dell (or a hands-on repair shop) was the best way to go, short of an FFR.

[buckaction.livejournal.com]

The box prolly had some policy lockdowns on it (removing the run box can be done with security policies)

a way around that is to open task manager, and use the "new task" button on the Applications tab.

[darkblade1.livejournal.com]

That's what I had thought. I don't think she knew about it. I asked her if she the administrator, but that was a silly question...because as techs we all know the response. "I don't know. I'm computer ill-literate."

Wonderful....

[dmsalem00.livejournal.com]

Anything that's left out the mighty "MSConfig" I don't completely trust, not even my precious Win2k. It's the hardest to kill spyware on due to that and that alone.